Illegal Protest

Well well isn’t this interesting to see. The son of Mayor Thomas O’Neill wrote the following editorial in the Standard Speaker on September 4th. I had several comments on the article - none of which have appeared. So I decided to comment here where I have free speech - on my own blog.

Shenandoah trying to come together

(From The Standard Speaker)

Published: Thursday, September 4, 2008 4:25 AM EDT

Editor,

I was one of the participants at the unity gathering at the Kahillat Israel Nondenominational Christian Church in Shenandoah. Some who attended commented to me afterwards that they felt as if they sat in on an evangelical political rally. Their comments seemed to have been made sarcastically though because of the religious and political undertone of the main speakers. Leaders from various state and Hispanic organizations spoke to show their support for our town’s Latinos, and to gain the media coverage.

That’s because, Thomas, it was indeed a political rally. The sponsors have a political agenda and that agenda is to legalize illegal aliens and turn them to citizens so that their Hispanic power base increases even more. They are also acting as agents of the government of Mexico to further their PR efforts to induce sympathy for the Mexican illegal alien. If Mexico truly cared about its citizens, it would not EXPORT them to the United States for a better life! Your last line belies the true motivation behind the “unity rally”. It was to gain MEDIA ATTENTION for MALDEF - which has MILLIONS of DOLLARS to spend helping ONLY Mexicans who are here in this country - most of them here illegally.

The gathering did bring members of our community together though in a positive way. People left the event knowing that they are not alone in their frustrations with the racial tensions in our town.

The 600 or so people at the Voice of the People USA rally also left knowing they are not alone and that they are in the majority. The “racial tensions” in the town are from several things. First, the presence of non-English speaking illegal aliens from Mexico in the town induces racial tensions because they cannot communicate, they are taking jobs from Americans because they work for slave wages and they are committing crimes in the community. Of COURSE the citizens of Shenandoah are tired of seeing these people run around breaking laws without being punished! Not only are they breaking the law just BEING HERE, but several of the people involved in this Ramirez “beating” death are repeat offenders of driving without a license, aggravated assault and the list goes on.

The SECOND cause of racial tensions is coming from Crystal Dillman herself and her new MALDEF “handlers” who are encouraging her accusations at the town. Funny how none of the accusers mention that Ramirez ALSO uttered racial epithets at the white teens. It’s only a problem if racial slurs are uttered by whites? The “racial tensions” are being STOKED by the likes of MALDEF and Dr Agapito “we will never assimilate” Lopez. All of these people who claim to be in Shenandoah to promote Unity are the actual perpetrators of the DIVISION in the town. They are from OUTSIDE the town - even going so far as to bus people to Shenandoah from CHICAGO. Are they trying to express unity between Shenandoah and CHICAGO? They wanted their “unity” gathering - the first one - to appear successful so they pumped it up with people from ANOTHER STATE! You know why? Because they knew that they would not get a large turnout from the town they had accused of being a racist town. It’s just laughable for a group to jump into an issue, hurl insults at a town and then pose as “unifiers” of the town. What a laughable piece of crap!

At the same time, a group calling themselves “the voice of the people” was rallying across town. Their rhetoric seemed counter productive and their actions spoke louder than their words. They seemed angry and bitter towards immigrants in general. Their arrival was divisive to the community and in no way have they brought about healing.

There was no “rhetoric” at the Voice of the People USA rally. Only truth was being spoken and the “voices” of Shenandoah were quite enthusiastic. All of the people involved in the VOPUSA rally make ZERO money from doing this and in fact it costs them money to ATTEND in the first place. They stand to gain NOTHING except to help a town defend themselves against the VICIOUS ATTACKS by the likes of MALDEF with the help of the supposed fiancee of the victim, Luis Ramirez. You are DEAD WRONG when you say VOPUSA is “angry and bitter towards immigrants in general”. In fact, I’d have to say the majority of people at the rally and speaking are descendants of “immigrants” themselves but not the ILLEGAL kind. So to call us “bitter towards immigrants” could not be farther from the truth.

The anti-immigration rally on the most part was taking advantage of our town’s economic condition. Poverty has gripped our region in a severe way. The Hispanics simply became the rally’s whipping-board for everything that is wrong with our society.

The people who are “taking advantage of your town’s economic condition” are the illegal aliens who have arrived there in a depressed economy to put even more American citizens in Shenandoah out of work, depress the local wages and essentially live like parasites off the depressed economy. They are STILL better off in Shenandoah than they are in Mexico but that does not make it right for them to come here. The other people taking advantage are the outsiders from MALDEF who have descended upon this town to exploit the racial tension so that they can point to the white residents of Shenandoah and say “see how racist Americans are against Mexicans”. The people who are being DEMONIZED are Americans! The illegal aliens have chosen to break the laws - we don’t need to demonize them - we just need to point out their illegal behavior coming into the country and that it continues once they arrive in the form of driving without licenses and insurance, driving while intoxicated and aggravated assaults or worse.

It is true that our town is impoverished and that is one of the reasons why the Hispanics are moving here. They are here because of the low cost of living. They are also willing to work hard manual labor jobs that the average person will not work.

Correction. Americans are very willing to do hard labor and they have been doing hard labor jobs for the entire history of our country. These jobs that illegal aliens are taking are PAYING LESS THAN AN AMERICAN CITIZEN CAN LIVE ON. Why is that? Because the employers are GREEDY and SELFISH and because Americans need to pay taxes and insurance and register their vehicles.. these are all laws the citizen is required to follow and the illegal alien is NOT. Thus, illegal aliens come here, stack up 20 or more per house to save money, work under the table for cash and send half of it BACK to the MEXICAN or GUATEMALAN economy!

We also have to realize that most of the Hispanics that immigrated to our region left behind in their native countries the most impoverished conditions imaginable.

That is not our problem. We cannot save the poor of the world by inviting them to our country!!! If you care so much about the impoverished of the world - go work for the Peace Corps and do some good for them in their own country!

I have seen this kind of extreme poverty first hand. In the early 1990’s, I lived in Ecuador, India, Malaysia, and Australia. People living in the hills of Duran in Ecuador are living in sugarcane huts.

When I returned to the United States I was grateful for what I had and the little inconveniences were just that — little inconveniences compared to how the poor live in Ecuador.

The people in Ecuador looked at me with such curiosity and they were the most loving people. I washed my clothes with them, ate with them, and we had to communicate in body language because I could not speak their language. There was one thing that they loved to do however and that was laugh. They were not aware of what they did not have in terms of technology because they were pretty much isolated from the rest of the world. On the most part they are content to live in their community because the community is their family. They could rely on one another in times of need.

If these people are so family oriented, why are they so willing to leave their families behind to come to a foreign country for a better life? Hmmm?

That is how most of the Hispanics in Shenandoah would like to live. They would like to reach out to their neighbors and to their community free from racial bias, bigotry, and hate. They understand implicitly what we give to the members of our community we give to ourselves.

Shenandoah would be happy to welcome immigrants of all races to their town if they were coming here LEGALLY and in doing so, they wished to learn the LANGUAGE and assimilate into becoming an American. But what we have is something different entirely. We have foreigners coming here illegally, “living in the shadows (their choice)” and refusing to learn our language or assimilate. Meanwhile they are happy to send their MANY children to our schools paid for by the local taxpayers, and take jobs from Americans in Construction, Hospitality, Agriculture, Manufacturing because they will work for peanuts and also get free health care at our hospitals. WHAT A COUNTRY EH?

Our town might be ailing but the cure is in the people. Whenever we enhance the wellbeing of a person in need we in turn enhance our own lives. This type of living is becoming lost in our modern, high-tech society, but it is something we can learn from the Hispanic population.

Ah yes.. Mr Ramirez was a shining example of those Hispanic family values.. allegedly sleeping with Crystal Dillman’s 15 year old half sister at the same time he was fathering children with Crystal out of wedlock.. and he led her along that he was going to marry her.. for how long?

The foreigners are coming to our country because they want their children and grandchildren to have better opportunities and a better life as Americans. That is what makes our country the greatest nation on earth and a beacon of light and hope for the other nations of the world.

I’m sure they are but that does not make the United States of America a LIFEBOAT for everyone who wants a better life. Immigrants are welcomed here to the tune of 2 MILLION per year. That is more than ALL OF THE COUNTRIES OF THE WORLD COMBINED. How DARE you say that America and Americans are not welcoming to immigrants ?

As for the group calling themselves ‘the voice of the people’ they seem to have an unenlightened voice. Especially, when you consider that our community is trying to come together to bring about change for the better.

Oh you will see change in Shenandoah because the voice of the people in that town have been enlightened and it was not from the “unity” gathering that you attended.

Thomas F. O’Neill,

Shenandoah native

Panorama of rally

Dan worked all day on processing the photos and video from the rally yesterday. You can find many of them here at his post on Digger’s Realm on the rally. You can also read Wendy Medishefshki’s coverage of the rally here at Pa Pundit site. The videos from the rally with the speakers and other happenings at the rally are here on YouTube.

The rally was relatively short by normal Voice of the People USA standards and all the speakers held the attention of the rally goers for the most part UNTIL Crystal Dillman, the fiancee of Luis Ramirez, showed up with some other girls and with a Mexican flag and began shouting “racists” at the crowd.

Gee I thought Crystal and her crowd were pushing for “unity” - then why was Crystal at OUR rally trying to incite an attack? Could it have been a cheap ploy for attention because for once the patriotic citizens of Shenandoah were getting all the media attention? You will notice that NONE of the people from the Voice of the People USA rally went over to the Unity gathering to try to disrupt their little “unity” charade. So.. I ask you .. who are the instigators and who are acting like mature adults? For the most part, after the initial reaction, the crowd gathered at Babe Ruth Memorial Park in a show of unity for enforcing the laws, ignored the attempts by Crystal Dillman and company to disrupt the rally and cause a disturbance that would have over-shadowed the peaceful rally. Nice try Crystal. Your lack of class shows very clearly in acts like these. I was proud of the group for resisting the attempts by Crystal and her friends to goad them into reacting.

All the speakers at the rally were well-received by the crowd and after the rally ended, it seemed there was not enough time to talk to everyone who wanted to know more. Digger printed up only 30 flyers with some links and info and those were gone in the first 10 minutes! It’s expensive to print up a lot of flyers and we aren’t paid by anyone to do what we do but at the next rally I think we’ll spring to have copies done at a copy center before the rally. View the flyer here

One thing I noticed at this rally is - here are a group of people thrust into the immigration debate spotlight. They haven’t all been watching Lou Dobbs and all of this is quite new to them. They have a lot of catching up to do to combat the rhetoric flying around and the more educated they become about the illegal immigration situation and what they can do about it, the more positive outcomes will result from this tragedy. This incident that has thrust them into the spotlight is a real wake-up call for their small community and I really wish it didn’t take something like this to galvanize people to band together and fight the scourge of illegal immigration. How many more communities will have this kind of culture clash result in a death - whether it be an American or another illegal alien - before that community wakes up and begins participating in being part of the solution?

Here’s a photo Dan captured of Crystal and her buddies holding the Mexican flag while shouting “racists” at our group.

Yeah that’s a real “unifying” thing to do Crystal at a Pro-American rally now isn’t it?

Dan and I drove 2 hours to Shenandoah, PA to speak at a Voice of the People USA Rally being held there to counter the hate speech which has descended upon the town ever since the July 12th incident where several teens have been accused of attacking a 25 year old illegal alien Mexican, Luis Ramirez, which then resulted in his death days later in the hospital.

The accused teens are out on bail and there has been a preliminary hearing so far. The trial date and venue have not been set. Some of the relatives of the accused teens were at the rally and we spoke with them. We hope to share some additional information that has not come out in the media, that we learned from them as well.

The turnout from this small town of 5600 people was phenomenal! The police presence was also incredible and the weather held out perfectly even though thunderstorms had been predicted. The police estimated around 600 people attending and the crowd was quite enthusiastic and vocal in their reception of the speakers. There were some skinhead types among the crowd but it’s a free country and Voice of the People USA were not excluding anyone, even the opposition, who made a brief appearance while displaying a Mexican flag. The crowd reacted but then resisted the attempts by the girls to get a reaction and there were no incidents.

We have lots of photos and video to process from the 8 hour day today which we hope to have up by the end of the weekend. There were many reporters and camera people there so it should be interesting to see how the event is portrayed in the various media.

The atmosphere at this rally was quite energizing and the entire time a helicopter hovered around overhead - we aren’t sure if it was a news helicopter or a police helicopter. I would have to say there were about 20 police there - it seemed from two different departments - perhaps some State troopers and some local police. It was comforting having all the police there since this incident has divided this town and created a great amount of hostility between many of the residents.